Deli Run
by FlowerPot21
Summary: Reasons why a simple deli run turns into a big ordeal when four grown men are involved...NS, CW
1. Prologue

Deli Run

Prologue

The shift had been long, tedious, and boring as hell. The two teams had merged once they discovered that their cases were related to each other, and they had all congregated in the break room, taking up all the space like they used to, much to other employees' chagrin because the coffee would be completely gone, and the former graveyard team got very territorial like a pack of lions in a savannah.

Exhausted of all possibilities of their bizarre case, the CSIs just sat around, tapping pencils, exchanging crime scene photos, and bouncing new theories off each other now and then.

When they got up to get coffee, however, seating arrangements changed as Warrick sat next to Catherine and Nick sat next to a six month pregnant Sara, Grissom and Greg now sat on opposite ends of the table, both rolling their eyes at all the love that had just been rushed into the room.

Suddenly, Sara's stomach growled loudly and she blushed as she felt the baby roll to the other side of her belly, making her proportion look lopsided. Nick looked at her and chuckled.

"Hungry?" He asked.

She glared at him.

"What the hell do you think?" She snapped. "I'm six months pregnant with your baby. I would think you'd have it figured out that I'm hungry all the time."

"Okay, Uncle," Nick surrendered, frowning at her sour mood.

Catherine giggled at the couple as they rolled their eyes at each other. Warrick shook his head as he placed his arm around her shoulders, playing with a strand of her hair. In contrast to Nick and Sara's relationship, Catherine and Warrick were just sickening, especially when it came to matters such as lunch. The couple would turn to each other and have a deep, long discussion, seeming to forget that there were other people around, innocent victims of their pathetic puppy love.

"What do you want to eat?" Nick asked Sara as he got up to grab the last doughnut.

"Can you go to the deli?" Sara requested.

Nick shook his head.

"Sara, you hate the deli," he mentioned. "You always say how disgusting it really is despite its claim that everything's fresh and clean…especially the restrooms."

"But I'm hungry," she whined. "Make sure the deli's clean."

"The deli sounds good," Catherine said. "But can we trust you guys to get us lunch and come straight back?"

All four men assure the women that it would be a piece of cake.

"Okay, this is EXACTLY what we want," Catherine began. "I want the grilled turkey and cheese, toasted on rye marble bread with lettuce, pickle, and mayo. Be sure to get cheddar cheese on that. Sara wants the fried catfish sandwich with Swiss cheese and everything except hot peppers, onions and the fish paste that goes with it and a regular salad with cottage cheese. Got it?"

"Yeah," Nick nodded confidently.

The men got up and headed out.

"Trust us," Greg said.

Catherine and Sara looked at each other, knowing that some way or another, the four men's brains would give out, in favor of testosterone, and the four of them together would manage to turn a small twenty minute trip to the deli into something they could avoid.

"I'd say two hours tops," Sara sighed, biting into an apple.

Catherine rolled her eyes.

"Yeah, wishful thinking," Catherine snorted sarcastically. "Remember what happened last week when we sent them to go order the cake for your baby shower?"

"Oh yeah," Sara chimed. "Then we'd better give 'em three."

"And I bet you anything that at least one of them doesn't have their cell phone," Catherine predicted as she sipped at some tepid coffee. "Namely Warrick. Part of me wants to give them the benefit of the doubt though. How hard could going to the deli be?"

About as hard as Nick, Warrick, Grissom, and Greg could make it out to be…


	2. Reason Number One: Digression

Deli Run

1. Reason Number One: Digression

Digress _(v.i.) _**1. **_to deviate or wander away from the main topic or purpose; _**2. **_to turn aside_

Man is a reed, the weakest in nature, but he is a thinking reed.

-_Pascal_

1:35 P.M.

En Route to Deli

On such a beautiful, bright, smog free day in Vegas, who wouldn't want to go out for a leisurely lunch? Or even a stroll for that matter because the temperature had maintained a perfect, dry, eighty degrees, comfortable walking weather.

All of these thoughts ran through Nick's mind as they drove by the strip to get to the deli. Warrick decided to drive since he drove the fastest out of the four of them. Warrick was particularly intent on staying focused on getting lunch for the women because he definitely remembered how upset Catherine had been at him for not paying attention to what she said and messing up the cake for Sara's baby shower, which she'd be planning for weeks. Both he and Nick got a great chuck of their asses chewed off, especially when Sara got wind of what happened to her cake.

No, Warrick would remember what the women wanted, not for his own sake, then for the sake of his common men sitting on the side of him and in the back seat. Nick had a short attention span, so naturally, he would truly forget what Sara wanted, Greg had washed his hands of both of them, saying that he was single for a reason, and Grissom…well, he never was receptive to either of the women anyway, so it didn't matter to him one way or the other.

Basically, they'd all be screwed if their little trip went wrong.

"Nick, pop quiz," Warrick began. "What does Sara want?"

"A fried catfish sandwich with everything except hot peppers, onion and fish paste and a regular salad with cottage cheese," Nick answered confidently. "Look, I've got it man. The deli's not that far, okay?"

Warrick cast a doubtful glance at Nick, who looked a little indignant.

"I don't appreciate your tone," he snapped.

"Have you conveniently forgotten about the cake thing?" Warrick reminded Nick.

"Oh yeah," Greg chimed in. "So I guess if we manage to screw this up, that'll be strike three and we're all going to die because Cath and Sara, who is _six months pregnant_, by the way, are going to kill us and dump our bodies at the Body Farm."

"The cake thing wasn't that big a deal," Nick said in a casual drawl. "Once we put it in the freezer over night, it was as good as new."

This time was Grissom's to fume at him.

"Nick, Sara's baby shower was ruined because of the cake," he explained. "Not only did you end up getting some weird flavor, the guests had to wait until next shift to even get a piece of cake, and by then, the party had been long over."

Nick quietly admitted to himself that Sara's baby shower cake had turned into a complete fiasco. It was such a beautiful cake: they had just found out that they were having a boy, so the cake was decorated with sports memorabilia with part of it a basketball, baseball, and football, with a tiny teddy bear toy placed in the middle. It said 'Congratulations Mommy and Daddy' and it had blue frosting.

Sara wanted the marble cake, and somehow, the woman at the bakery didn't understand what he wanted, so she ended up making some kind of weird marzipan flavor, and he felt bad and paid for the cake anyway, since business had been bad for the Greek family.

Letting the marzipan matter slide, the men decided to grab a quick lunch at the busiest burger joint in town: In and Out Burger.

While they spent about an hour in the restaurant, the cake sat in in the truck, melting.

They guys thought nothing of leaving it inside the car because they had parked under a shady tree, and it was only seventy five degrees outside. They thought it wouldn't melt. When they got back to the truck however, they found out that they were as wrong as two left shoes.

Could they be trusted to do any kind of simple task after that? No, probably not.

"Man, this traffic is the pits," Greg noticed.

A few seconds later, the unthinkable would happen…

A loud screech of tires on hot asphalt, rubber going everywhere and another two ton hunk of metal t-boning another in the middle of the intersection.

Warrick blinked, not believing what he just witnessed and his picked up the radio receiver.

"This is CSI Brown," he said as the others got out the car and headed out to the wreck. "There's been a car wreck on Flamingo; we're in need of immediate medical assistance."

Warrick rushed over, and much to his surprise, the two drivers were not hurt. Instead, they were about to hurt each other as both of their high class, high priced cars lay in ruins on the crowded street. Nick and Greg were holding the two men back so they wouldn't get into a physical fight while Grissom inspected the damage. Warrick shook his head.

****

2:15 P.M.

Stuck on Flamingo

Watson's Jewelry

The guys got back in the truck and decided to take an alternate route to the deli.

"Okay, back to what we were doing," Nick said. "But traffic is going to be horrible all the way around, so what do you say we wait it out?"

Greg sat up.

"Wait it out?" He asked. "How could you say that? I-wait, that is a good idea."

"How is that?" Grissom ventured to ask. "Do you _want_ to get us killed?"

"They'll understand about traffic," Greg explained. "It's horrible all the time. Anyway, Warrick, you said that you wanted to ask Catherine to marry you, so let's go to that jewelry shop so you can get her a ring."

Warrick, looking a bit irritated at their current situation, decided that it wouldn't hurt to wait about thirty minutes for traffic to clear out. He did want to get Catherine an engagement ring. She kept on dropping hints at him about getting married soon: filing a change of address, looking at TLC shows, and picking up catering brochures from promoters in the mall. To say that she was ready for a commitment would be the ultimate understatement. Catherine was secretly determined to be a perfect bride.

Warrick shook his head and sighed. She'd been watching way too many episodes of _Bridezillas_.

Giving in, thinking about what she would like, Warrick pulled over and parked.

Watson's Jewelry had Catherine's sense of style written all over it. Modern, big, and shiny. Not that Catherine was materialistic or anything, it just happened that those were the things that she liked if she were to buy herself jewelry.

Greg and Nick assisted Warrick in looking around, asking her what she wanted.

"She told me to surprise her," Warrick said. "I want to get her something really beautiful and unique, like-"

"Like she is," Nick and Greg said in unison, rolling their eyes.

Grissom had gone to do his own thing, pondering over people's fascination with polished rocks. He walked slowly, looking at necklaces and bracelets. Everything had been meticulously cleaned and the sun outside made the store glow with prism colors.

"Gil?" A woman's soft voice inquired.

Grissom looked up and he was thoroughly surprised.

"Claire?" He asked. "Wow, what are you doing here?"

The woman blushed and pushed her long, blonde hair behind her ear. She didn't look a day older than forty, but Grissom knew that she was about forty five by now.

"I'm on vacation," she said. "It's good to see you Gil. You look…different."

"Thanks," he said nervously. "You look nice. How have you been?"

"I've been good," she sighed. "I'm just looking for a nice piece of jewelry to indulge myself with. I just got a bonus at work, so that's why I'm here."

"Well, I hope you have a nice time here," Grissom said before turning to leave. "It was nice seeing you again."

"Is that all you want to tell me Gil?" She asked, raising an eyebrow.

Grissom had dated Claire about ten years ago. They were almost engaged, but everything fell apart when he met Sara at Harvard. Claire never trusted him completely anymore after that, and she left for New York. He realized how badly he had hurt her, and seeing her now, ten years later was astounding, and he felt guilty all over again.

"Do you want to go get some coffee?" He asked. "There's a lot we have to talk about."

Claire grinned slightly. "Um, sure," she said.

Across the store, Warrick had found the perfect ring for Catherine, but he was a bit hesitant to buy it at the moment. They were trying to save up to buy new things for their new house. The ring would cost seven hundred and twenty three dollars including tax. Warrick never considered himself impulsive, but he wanted to ask Catherine to marry him sooner rather than later, and he knew that if he didn't buy the ring today, someone else surely would.

"Okay," he sighed. "She's going to want to injure me, but she'll love me at the same time so she'll stop working so hard at hinting."

Nick chuckled and Greg looked at some really expensive watches.

"I can see why it's so tempting to want to live beyond your means," he commented.

Warrick handed his credit card over to the saleswoman. He felt nervous about this because now that he was getting the ring, he had to get his words together to ask her. Catherine didn't like all the sappy, overly romantic things. She was the type of woman who liked the unexpected, unlike himself, who liked to plan things down to the last detail.

"Um, I'm sorry sir," the woman said. "But your credit card has been declined."

"What?" Warrick exclaimed.

"You apparently have insufficient funds," she explained. "I'm sorry."

Warrick ran his hand over his face.

"I need to go to the bank," he said. "This just doesn't make any sense. I just deposited my paycheck."

"Okay, we'll go get Grissom," Nick said, turning around to look for him. "Wait, where'd he go?"

"Don't tell me," Warrick said.

Grissom was nowhere to be found in the store.

"Okay," Warrick instructed. "Nick and I will go to the bank, Greg, you look for Grissom, where ever he may be. Look in all the obvious places first."

With no money, a vanished Grissom, and the task of still going to the deli for the ladies, and over an hour on the road, the guys figured they'd better hurry up before the girls got upset…


End file.
